Need pointers on tactical combat techniques

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Matthew
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Need pointers on tactical combat techniques

Postby Matthew » Fri Mar 30, 2007 9:07 am

In close games, being good a tactical combat can make a big difference. It seems to come down to knowing how to choose your targets, how many spaces to move, and when to retreat from the battle.

Does any have anyone have advice or does it just take a lot of games to gain battle experience?

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Cabman
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Postby Cabman » Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:03 pm

From my experience only many many battles do the job... At the begining of my Moo career PK helped me a lot. We were prepairing different design fleets with "alt menlo" and "alt crunch" cheats and then tried it in battles. It was great thing to improve my tactic skills :)

marhawkman
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Postby marhawkman » Fri Mar 30, 2007 7:39 pm

Yeah. you need to think about your strategy for winning and how to counter your opponent's strategy while implementing yours.

Might sound simple, might not, but I've found it to be the biggest factor in choosing how to design my ships.

rekka
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Postby rekka » Tue Dec 11, 2007 5:23 pm

A sure fire strategy is to always be prepared for anything as well. You want a well balanced fleet, but at the same time you do not want to let your opponent know what you have-- at least not all of it. Typically I'll have one cruiser design that is pretty equally balanced offense/defense. That's usually what I let them see in small squabbles. And mid-late in the game those never have missiles on them. To that you want to add some ships that are heavy one way or the other, but are not balanced at all: ships with leaders on them you want more survivability, same with bombers, etc. I always build a small fleet (usually 3 BB and 5 cr or something like that) of pure missile ships. these are always: p. cloak, fast mis. rack, and two-rack missiles in all eight slots. And only pull them out for that big fleet vs fleet battle, because they typically will not expect it/have planned for it since none of your other ships have ever used missiles. you get every missile in the air (i know, there is no air) in one turn before they have a chance of getting destroyed... and mix them up, have most of them regular mirv and throw in a couple of e. guidance system missiles.
That's just one example. The point is to be prepared for anything though, that way while your opponent is going back to try and make up for something he didnt plan on seeing, you are already there for what ever he comes up with.
What everyone said about testing as well is very true. Never field a design you have not tested.
never use a ship design that you yourself dont know how to counter
go in with what you need to win...
blah, blah, blah... there is a whole lot more to it. I will tell you now though, large battles always have at least one ship somewhere with a warp disip.

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philcha
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Postby philcha » Wed Feb 13, 2008 2:21 pm

A few unconnected thoughts:

Late game: have the best computers - shooting first is a huge advantage with advanced beam weapons.

Always be clear about your objectives for the battle - do or die; or inflict as much damage as possible with minimal / zero losses. Be prepared to retreat and sacrifice undefendable colonies - better to lose just a colony rather than a colony + fleet.

If you have Class 3 or better shields, make sure the strongest side of your shields faces the enemy at the end of each turn.

If you have good mobility:
  • * Move toward the outer edges of the enemy formation, so it's hard for them to concentrate fire on 1 ship. Particularly effective if you have good shields and manouevre as above.
    *If they fire tons of missiles or fighters and you have mainly beams: (a) move just close enough to hit their ships with HV beams; (b) use normal weapons to reduce the missiles / fighters; move away but ensure that at the end of the move your shipsd are at an angle where PD weapons can hit the missiles / fighters. The rationale is that you want to last until the enemy are out of missiles / fighters, then your beam weapons can strike withj impunity. Works best if you're attacking an enemy system, as the enemy won't be so happy to retreat.
If you have mainly missiles and the enemy does the "fall back and thin them out" manoeuvre, move forward without firing, so they don't have the space and time for "fall back and thin them out" and you have ammo left.

With missiles, use 3 groups: fast, armoured to absorb as much PD firepower as possible; heavy hitters to take down shields; EMG for quick kills. In this time your manoeuvres and firing so that the missiles arrive in that order.

If torpedoes (fire every 2 turns) are your main weapons, dance your ships back and forwards, and keep your strongest shield side towards the enemy at the end of each turn.

And, as you said, pick your targets. Especially concentrate fire on as few enemy ships as possible if they're too tough for 1 ship to kill themn instantly. But don't over-kill enemy ships if using missiles (not a peroblem with beams) - use the excess firepower to start weakening another target (or perhaps kill it if not tough or several o fyour ships have sdpare firepower). That means: (a) your weapons should be spread over as many slots as possible, to give flexibility; (b) turn "off" missile / torpedo slots that should not fire on the current target.

c'g~
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Postby c'g~ » Tue Feb 19, 2008 8:32 am

Hi guys!

Sorry for off-topic. Just want to say, that I created a Mod, where U can surprise Ur opponent with interesting Ship design decisions and Use All Ur tactical knowledge (that U mentioned before) for utilization of those decisions and flexibly counter Ur opponents designs. So try it (U can find details here: viewtopic.php?t=559)


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